Optimist
by Mya Latti
Summary: In comparison to other regions, relations between the Johto leaders weren't exactly ideal. So upon hearing that Morty had passed out in his gym one afternoon, Whitney figured now was a good time to rectify that. But uh...driving to his house in the dark and not telling him she was coming had seemed like a much better idea in her head — Morty/Whitney friendship.


_I'm not quite sure what I wanted to achieve with this, but I think I just wanted to write about Morty, haha. I really like him and I also like the idea of him and Whitney having a relationship that isn't romantic (I don't ship them, but friendship is nice). I also don't write about female characters too often, so it was kinda fun to do that. And despite all the crying and whining, I think Whitney would be a lovely person who genuinely does care for others. Okay, all done.  
_

_Rated T for a few swears._

* * *

_and the walls kept tumbling down on the city that we loved,  
grey clouds rolled over the hills bringing darkness from above_

how am I gonna be an _**optimist **_about this?

* * *

Morty got exhausted often.

It wasn't because his leader position was particularly taxing or anything, because it wasn't _at all_. He didn't get many challengers, most trainers headed to the big city first and winning against Whitney was no easy feat. So that meant most of his time at work was spent filling in forms and other boring official stuff for the League and then training when that was finished (which it never was). So yeah, that was fine.

It was because of his title. You know, that _'Mystic Seer of the Future' _thing that everyone branded him_. _It took it all out of him, it was so mentally and physically draining and yet when people came up to him and asked what was going to happen to them next week, he still fucking told them. It was only when he would pass out later than evening or was unable to even move from a crippling headache that he'd regret it - but he didn't learn. This had been going on for what, at least four or five years now? It was probably longer than that, he couldn't even remember anymore.

Don't get him wrong, it's not like they used him, they just didn't realise. He didn't blame them either, otherworldly powers were really damn confusing to try and understand, even he didn't quite understand them himself a lot of the time.

But of course when Whitney heard he had collapsed in his gym one afternoon, she had to visit. Compared to other regions, relations between the leaders weren't exactly ideal - they got on fine enough at the League meetings, but for the rest of the time they just sort of did their own thing and kept to themselves. She figured it was because their gyms were all quite far away and none of them really had a common ground. Like, they were all _really _different people as opposed to say, the Sinnoh region (Sinnoh was the northern region, right? Geography had never been her forte) where the majority of the leaders were young and enthusiastic. Everyone here was so serious!

So, being the overly friendly person she was, Whitney thought now was the perfect time to do something about that.

She liked Morty anyway. He was a nice guy and when she thought about it, if she had passed out she'd want someone to visit her. So upon being told what had happened, she had closed her gym up early (making her trainers very happy), jumped in her car, had driven twenty minutes before realising she was going the wrong direction but now was _finally _on her way to Ecruteak. It wasn't her fault with the driving thing though! She hardly ever had to go north and directions were not her strong point - she still didn't even know her way around Goldenrod properly.

Alright, so back to the present. Now that she had a moment to actually think about what she was doing, she was starting to wonder if it was even a good idea to go visit him in the first place. Because seriously, what was she going to say? Just asking how he was would probably sound weird, she'd have to say something more comforting otherwise the conversation would just stop and ugh, it would be awkward. What if he wasn't even in his gym anymore? She'd have to find out where he lived and maybe he wouldn't appreciate being barged in on when he was obviously unwell. Should she get flowers? That's what you usually did when someone was sick, right? She hardly even knew him though!

Placing her forehead on the steering wheel (for the record, she was at the traffic lights), she contemplated turning around. It would be easier and get her out of an uncomfortable situation, then she could go home and rug up on her lounge for the rest of the evening before facing another long day at work. _But _she wouldn't get to know Morty better if she did that and she also would have wasted at least forty minutes, so she didn't.

And then she went and wasted another twenty pulled up in his gym's parking lot, mentally prepping herself. You know, Whitney wasn't nearly as confident as everyone thought she was, she just liked people. People she _knew._

Eventually though, she did get out the car, pushed the gym's doors open and was greeted with...darkness. Well, that was just fantastic. It looked like everyone had left already and in that case, how the hell was she going to find Morty? No, maybe not actually. His gym was always dark, wasn't it? He had those bottomless pits or something so trainers couldn't see where they were going. Maybe he was around after all, all hope was not lost!

"The gym is closed for the day."

Cool.

The voice made her jump though and she blinked a few times, getting her eyes adjusted. Oh, it was just the guide. "I can see that," She answered. "And I guess Morty's not around then?"

"He's gone home, Whitney."

"So where's his house?" The guide considered this for a moment, probably weighing up whether it was appropriate to give out the home address of the person he worked for. After a minute or so, he sighed and pointed her just down the street. He knew she was legit and more that likely figured there wasn't _too _much harm in letting her know. She nodded and took off again, driving down the street and pulling into the unfamiliar driveway.

It was a nice place, she'd admit that - old and traditional, but kind of cute too. She could just imagine it now, all decked out in pink with a little flower garden out the front where she could chat to the neighbours and they would admire her adorable pokemon. Okay, it would never happen but a girl could dream, right? It was a little eerie though too and that sort of put a kibosh to her fantasy. It was fine though, that was just because of the ghost pokemon...or the darkness...or the cold weather. Or maybe even the unfamiliarity and the fact she was absolutely terrified because she _hardly even know Morty!_

At this point, her heart was pounding as she knocked on the front door. He's going to open it at any moment and then she'll have to explain herself and will look like an idiot, then she'll be embarrassed at their next League meeting at it'll be _so _awkward. And you know what? It certainly didn't help that Ecruteak was so damn freezing either, she was actually shaking and that only made her feel even worse. It was funny how going an hour north could make such a difference with the weather, Goldenrod was _never _this cold and she wasn't used to it.

There was a creaking noise and suddenly all focus was back on the now-open door in front of her. A scarf and headband-less Morty was there too, watching her in confusion and she noticed that _man_, he looked exhausted. Maybe she'd woken him up, whoops.

He ran a hand through his hair and blinked a few times, probably trying to adjust his eyes to the light before speaking. "Whitney, what are you doing here?"

"Hello to you too," She poked her tongue out; trying to ignore the fact her heartbeat had just increased tenfold. "I heard you weren't very well, so I came to see how you were."

Now he wasn't angry or annoyed or anything at all, but instead he smiled. It was a gentle smile and all the nerves she'd felt had suddenly flown out the window. It was cool, he was cool. "Thank you," He nodded. "I'm fine, but are you sure you don't have something huge on next week? Something you need to know your future for?"

Huh, well fancy that. She supposed she should be offended, you know that he thought she'd only come to visit if she needed something. But it would have been a waste because seriously, they didn't know each other well enough at all to warrant being irritated. "Nope, I'm here because you're sick," If quizzed later on, Whitney would say that she'd never seen someone appear more relieved in her life. He also went from looking appreciative to _you-are-the-best-person-in-the-world _and she wondered why it meant so much. "Am I the first person to visit then?"

He shook his head. "My friend Eusine was around earlier, but he didn't stay long."

"Oh." She didn't like that. She wasn't sure _why _and she wasn't sure how, but the fact that someone else had visited him first irked her. It was completely ridiculous and she had to keep reminding herself that they weren't the best of friends so there was no reason to get like that, but it didn't really help. But she didn't have time to worry about this long because soon after, what she'd been dreading happened, their conversation trailed off and it was awkward. She could swear it got colder too and her shivering and slightly chattering teeth suddenly became glaringly obvious to both of them (she'd been distracted for a while and had forgotten about it).

Morty, upon realising that unlike him, she wasn't clad in a jacket and pants but rather shorts and shirt, smacked his forehead and then winced slightly. "I'm sorry, I always forget it's colder here," He waved his hand from the top of her head to her feet. "I would invite you inside, but I don't think my place is any warmer. I don't have heating at the moment."

"That's alright!" She cheered, just glad that the silence was broken. "We can go sit in my car if you like? It's got an awesome heater, but I never get to use it because it's not cold enough in Goldenrod." Without waiting for his answer, she grabbed onto his sleeve and pulled him outside towards the vehicle. She jumped in the driver's seat and started up the ignition, revelling in the fact that _wow_, she wasn't cold anymore and watched in slight amusement as Morty navigated his own way in.

But in all her haste and eagerness, she'd forgotten that her clefairy had fallen asleep on the way up and was still curled up in the back. She raised a finger to her lips and nodded in the direction of the tiny creature, hoping with all her might that it wouldn't wake up. It was a great battler, but clefairy had had a long day and it was a pain when it was tired. "You should really get your heating situation sorted, it's freezing here!" She exclaimed as quietly as possible. "Like, I've been here for all of five minutes, I can't even imagine what it would be like to live in this all the time. Does it ever snow? That'd be so pretty."

"Sometimes," He laughed. "And I've been waiting to get it fixed for months now, they keep saying they're going to come but always cancel at the last moment. It's kind of annoying, but I've always been here so I suppose I'm used to the crazy weather."

"I guess," She replied. "I don't think I could ever adjust though, I'd miss going to the beach too much! Have you ever been down to Goldenrod in summer? We get a lot of tourists around then, but it's still nice. I suppose they do come for a reason after all." She was talking a mile a minute, but she'd do anything to avoid that awkward silence again. Shudder.

"I think I went once when I was a kid and I definitely remember it being really busy. At least you'd get a lot of challengers to the gym then though, right?"

"So many, it's ridiculous." But she could only hold it off for so long and they trailed off again after that. She even found herself flicking her headlights on and off for something to do. Out of the corner of her eye, she was watching Morty who seemed desperately to be stopping himself from falling asleep. She turned the headlights off one final time after that, not wanting to make him feel any worse and exhaled loudly. Well, maybe it wasn't loudly, but every sound was magnified right now. "Do you want to go for a drive?"

"Sure," He nodded and she hit the accelerator, mentally saying thanks to Ho-Oh or whatever was up there that she had something to do. But now that posed another conundrum, where to drive to? She had no idea what was around Ecruteak and since she had gotten lost just getting here, chances weren't looking good now. She sighed, once again wondering if she should have thought her suggestion through a little better. "You should turn left at the end of my street," Man, was he a mind reader too? "And then continue for five or so minutes."

"Just tell me where to stop." As previously mentioned, Whitney was terrible with directions. It had actually started way back when she was a kid - she wasn't from Goldenrod originally and had been visiting the city with her mum and coming out of the department store, somehow she had gotten separated from her. She ran around for at least half an hour looking for her, hitting all sorts of twists and turns in the confusing place and had eventually wound up in the national park, curled up in the grass and sobbing her heart out.

It had not occurred to her seven-year-old self to wander back to the department store and ask for help or wait for mum to return, but by this point she had absolutely no clue how to get back there so there wouldn't have been much point anyway. Apparently she'd interrupted a bug catching contest too and the participants weren't very happy (her loud crying was scaring everything away), but the contest judge had taken pity on her and managed to calm her down enough that she could tell him what had happened. But to cut a long story short, he'd taken her back to the store and found mum waiting there, equally as stressed out.

Okay, she wasn't going to lie, to this day it was still the most terrifying thing that had ever happened to her. For a good few years afterwards just a mention of the city would make her shudder and she had decided she was never going to go back again, staying home whenever a trip was required for some reason or another. _But _as they tend to do, things happened and she realised it really wasn't as frightening as she remembered and like, ten years later she found herself the gym leader of the city. You know, now that she thought about it, she wasn't even quite sure herself how it had happened.

"And that is why you'll have to tell me where to stop," She said. "And don't worry, my sob story is over now too."

"Stop," She slammed down on the brakes, throwing them both forward slightly and making Morty laugh. "Sorry, I shouldn't have spoken so suddenly."

"It's fine," She waved off his concern and then turned to see where they were. It kind of looked like that big tower on the other side of the city that she always heard about, but it wasn't big at all and it appeared to be half demolished or at the very least half gone. "Where are we?"

"It's the Brass Tower," He answered. "Or it used to be, it burnt down over a century ago now. I'm sure you know the story though, right?"

Shit. Yeah, she did. Of course she did, everyone in Johto knew what had happened - maybe not as well as those who lived in Ecruteak, but they knew about it. And now she felt a little insensitive for thinking it was just an old building when it was so much more, a _tragedy _had happened there! She started to open her door when she felt something stop her, turning back around she found Morty who was shaking his head.

"We won't get out, it's too cold," He took his hand off her arm and smiling, she couldn't help but feel a little touched that he'd thought about her. Sitting back down, he pulled her knees up to her chest and peered out the windscreen again, looking properly at the charred remains of the tower. Despite it being part of their region's history, she'd never seen it in person before. "My great-great grandparents and great-grandparents used to come here before everything happened," He sighed. "My family still do now, but it's not the same as it was back then."

They fell into a silence again, but it was comfortable this time as she was watching the scene in front of her. Because it was dark, the tower was being lit up with small lanterns that were giving off an almost otherworldly sort of glow and brightening it up for the few people there. They were knelt on the ground near the base and they looked like they were praying, she wondered to who since Ho-Oh was often associated with the other tower across the city, so it probably wasn't the rainbow bird. She made a mental note to ask Morty about it later on (she didn't feel it was polite to at the moment) and sunk lower into her seat.

But you know, it was funny - sitting here, she felt humbled. It took a lot for her to think about things seriously, so it was quite remarkable. She could complain all she wanted about her job, that guy who was rude to her in the department store the other day and that really average coffee she had, but in comparison to this, those things were so tiny. With this...so many lives had been changed in an instant, it was hard to fathom what that would have been like.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Morty lean forward and rest his arms on her dashboard. His expression was kind of...well, she couldn't quite describe it but she could see that this place meant a lot to him. Of course it did, he'd mentioned earlier his family had lived in the city for generations and he was always talking about Ho-Oh at all their League meetings too, she should have realised earlier. At this revelation, she smiled again to herself - he was willing to share something so meaningful with her even though they hardly knew each other. At that moment she felt they had a sort of camaraderie and guess what? It was kind of nice.

"Whitney," He spoke up, voice barely a whisper but breaking the silence nonetheless. "I'm not sick."

"You're not?"

"I'm just tired," He pushed his hair out of his eyes, without the headband there it kept getting in the way. "The whole foresight thing is exhausting, it takes a lot out of you to do something like that."

Wait.

Oh. _Oh._

That's why he was so relieved earlier when she'd said she didn't want to know anything! The poor guy! She hit the accelerator quickly, pulling out of the parking lot and speeding back towards his place - here she was dragging him out the house when all he probably wanted to do was sleep. Man, if she'd known how exhausted he was and the reason for it, she would never have dragged him out of the house and into the cold air. Mind you, she had _thought _he was sick and had done that anyway, so what was she even saying? But to be fair, she'd been pretty desperate to break the awkward silence (and had kind of forgotten about the sick thing until now).

Still...she hardly knew him but she was well aware how much he used 'the whole foresight thing' to help out people in the city. It was a wonder that he didn't walk around in a half-zombie state the whole time; he must've been so dead!

"Are you okay?" He spoke up, clinging onto his seat for dear life and she turned the corner.

She nodded, eyes fixed on the road in front of her in determination. "I'm fine, you're not," She explained. "And I shouldn't have made you come out, I'm sorry."

He paused for a moment, considering his answer. During that time she had located his house again, driven into his driveway like a mad thing and was now getting out. They had managed to walk halfway across the driveway before Morty finally replied. "I'm alright, Whitney. I may be beyond exhausted, but this happens all the time so it's not like it's new or anything."

"But..." She stopped walking (which turned out to be a mistake because as soon as she stood still, she realised again how cold it was) and dropped her arms, which had been previously crossed, to her sides. "That's not good."

"Not really, no."

She pursed her lips, considering what course of action she was going to take now. Eventually she decided on grabbing his arm again and pulling him forward and towards his front door. He was tired and no matter what the reason for that, tired people need to be sleeping and _warm_, not freezing their asses off in crazy weather. "_You _are going to go sleep," She instructed, placing her hands on her hips. "And no if's or but's about it, okay?"

He smiled at her, apparently she was amusing somehow. "You know, I appreciate you coming to visit me. It was nice of you to trek all the way up here when you really had no obligation to."

"I'd want someone to visit me if I was sick," She shrugged. "But I'm uh, going to head off now. It's really dark and I should probably get home and oh...before I forget," She rummaged around in her bag and pulled out an old receipt and a pen, scrawling (very illegibly) on the back of it and then handing it over to Morty. "Here's my number. You can call or message if you need anything or you feel really bad or whatever. I'll usually answer straight away."

"Thanks," He nodded. "But in that case, I might go inside and pass out now."

* * *

Whitney felt her pokegear buzz in her lap about twenty minutes out of Ecruteak, she noted the unusual number (at the traffic lights) but opened the message up nonetheless. Upon reading it, she laughed quietly. It turned out he didn't pass out after all.

_I hope this is you, Whitney, I couldn't tell whether the fourth number was a two or a three so I've tried a whole bunch of different combinations. Nice handwriting, by the way. What I'm messaging to say though, is that I'll be in Goldenrod in a week because Eusine wants to show me something. I know it's not summer, but did you want to catch up? I won't be so tired this time._

And grinning like a complete idiot, she started to compose her reply. It was kind of rushed because the lights turned green, but she had his number now and it got the message across well enough.

_I'll b around. Will msg u with deets later, c u then!_

* * *

_Fun fact, this was written partly in Australia, partly in America. Thank you so much for sticking around this long!_


End file.
